Never to be Forgotten
by lionesseyes13
Summary: After Bellatrix's death, it falls to Narcissa to bury her sister.


Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Remembered

Somehow with all the celebration, everyone seemed to have forgotten that there was still work to be done, wounded to tend, and bodies to set to their rest. Narcissa hadn't forgotten it, and when an appropriate amount of time had passed, she rose from her seat beside heer husband and child, and, without a word, walked to the one person she was certain hadn't forgotten it, either.

"Minerva." This was not a time for honourifics. As the venerable witch turned to her, Narcissa noticed the marks of age. Minerva McGonagall had been fighting wars for decades, and, doubtlessly, she was hoping that she had put them behind her at long last.

"Yes, Narcissa?" Minerva's tone was laced with mistrust and suspicion, and perhaps rightly so. The Malfoys had been largely ignored, as though by collective consensus, strange as their position now as, caught between the new-fallen order and the restored world.

However, despite McGonagall's frigid tone, Narcissa lifted her chin with a combination of pride and humility that only a daughter of the House of Black could manage. "I should like to attend to my sister's body," she said, and intended to go on, but the resolve faltered; saying it made it _true_. Bellatrix was dead.

Something in the choked sound of Narcissa's voice caught Minerva's pity. Perhaps she was remembering that these were sisters, the girls, she'd taught twenty years earlier. Perhaps she was regretting not being able to do more when Bellatrix had been young and malleable -- if indeed Bellatrix ever had been such -- to shepherd her away from the Dark. Perhaps she was thinking of her own sister, and of the separation of years which did nothing to dim a love bonded in blood. Whatever the reason, her expression softened, and Narcissa, well-versed in reading what others gave away, saw it.

"Of course," she said, and Narcissa almost heard her add "Miss Black", certain that she was seeing a blonde girl in pristine Slytherin robes, not a fully-grown woman disheveled with war. "Of course. I would caution, though..." She glanced around at the revelry. "Be discreet."

Narcissa nodded, and swept away from the older woman. She moved quickly, hoping, with a keen intuition of mob mentality, that no one else had remembered Bellatrix.

The Great Hall was still littered in bodies, Death Eaters and their opponents alike. Those who had fought on the side of Hogwarts were now laid out with honour, until such time as they could be attended to properly by families and loved ones. The Death Eaters were forgotten, stepped over, and pushed aside. Narcissa was only glad it hadn't occurred to anyone to despoil their bodies; she did not believe all of those present were so high-minded that they would be above it. As she passed the rows of corpses, Narcissa tried not to look too close; any one of them might be a friend, or the son or daughter of one. She knew where Bellatrix had fallen; she moved directly towards that spot.

One body, though, did catch her attention, and for a moment she paused. _No... but Rodolphus was killed inside, and already taken home--'_So much had she learned in the hour's ceasefire, from Bellatrix's hollow eyes and a few scant words. But no – this body was slimmer, lighter. _Rabastan._ So. Another family tree obliterated. Sighing, Narcissa cast a protective charm over his body, vowing to return for it, or send someone for it, later. Her own duties came first.

Bellatrix lay on the cracked stones, crumpled in an inelegant heap where Molly Weasley's final vengeful blast had landed her. In the pale morning glow, with the etches of mocking laughter still etched on her face, she looked a great deal younger. Narcissa knelt at her head, folding her skirts neatly under her, and touched the tumbling raven locks, damp with sweat and spotting dew. _You died with wand in hand, Bella,_ she thought, _'doing what you were best at... history may not remember you fondly, but it will remember that you were a duelist to outmatch all others... Is this enough, for you? Is this not better than a return to Azkaban, or being taken unawares? It must be... it must be enough for you to have died with wand in hand..._

Narcissa closed her eyes against an unwelcome surge of emotion. For most of a year, it had been imperative to keep everything in check, to practice her lifelong skill of keeping her feelings locked away in an ice cage around her heart. Now they gushed forth, like waters in a spring thaw, and she felt tears leaking from between her eyelids.

The lie that had bought the assurance of her son's survival had cost her sister her life. If she had spoken truly, if she had told the Dark Lord the boy yet lived, perhaps Bellatrix would not have fallen. Narcissa had made a choice, and one she would not make differently if given the chance again, but she would have to live with the consequences.

And it struck her like a flood: she would never again hear a low, lilting voice call "Cissy!", never have her hair pulled as though she were still a girl in pigtails, never walk arm-in-arm through the gardens, discussing how much better the world could be, would be, never hear that mad, reckless laughter echoing down halls. The obsidian eyes were closed. No teasing glint would spark in them again.

There was no funeral, as far as these things go. It would have been foolish, to openly mourn a woman who had been, to the end, the Dark Lord's most loyal servant. Her body was burned, the ashes scattered in a garden at Ebony Manor. A small vial was sent to Areles Hall, dusted over her husband's grave. And a nameplate was set in the Black family graveyard, above her buried wand. Narcissa did it her herself, with little ceremony. _'That,'_ she thought, unable to keep a wry smile from her face, _'would not have pleased her.'_ Bellatrix would have wanted to be as spectacular in death as she was in life, her funeral an event. Narcissa could almost hear her chiding -- would have given almost anything to hear her chiding.

There were no mourners, apart from Narcissa, with Draco and Lucius standing at a respectful distance. She did not hold it against them. Draco had always been a little afraid of his aunt, and she and Lucius had never precisely gotten along. It was enough that they supported Narcissa in this.

Narcissa gazed a long while at the nameplate, a shining, dark granite, with a tiny, delicate border around the words:

BELLATRIX MORGAUSE BLACK-LESTRANGE  
13 APRIL 1959 - 30 JUNE 1998  
NOLITE DEDISCERE PRAEVALET AESTUM

Numbly, Narcissa conjured a wreath of black roses -- nothing else could be appropriate -- and lay them over the grave. They looked lonely and forlorn-- the lone spot of life in a field of death. Narcissa felt a seizing pain around her heart at the thought of consigning Bellatrix, _her_ Bellatrix, her lovely, passionate, vibrant Bellatrix, to this grey waste, to this expanse of people forgotten but for their names. She couldn't bear to think of Bellatrix, lost to time.

_'No…'_ she thought, staving off the tears that again threatened her. _'Whatever else Bellatrix did, she made certain she will be remembered.'_


End file.
